10 Awesome Augmented Reality Games for iPhone

Augmented Realty is set to be one of the biggest disruptive technologies of 2010/11 which combines the physical real-world environment using your camera with interactive digital data. Thanks to it, several amazing games for iPhone have poured into the App store in recent times.

1. Parallel Kingdom [Free]

Parallel Kingdom is a mobile location based massively multiplayer game that uses your GPS location to place you in a virtual world (with Google Maps) on top of the real world loaded with features such as a fighting mechanism, a virtual aid to the player, leveling up the character, instant messaging with other players, trading items and food and so on.

It is possibly the first app that gives you a fairly in-depth MMO on a mobile device. If you like World of Warcraft type of games then you should check this one out. This game is also available on the iPhone which means that there are even more players to interact with.

You can also chat with others, privately and in public. The only bad thing you’ll find is its servers which experience downtimes often. Except this, it is the best multiplayer game you will find in the App Store (from my personal experience).

2. AR Soccer

3. Sky Siege

Sky Siege is another awesome game for your iPhone. It transforms your physical environment into a deadly battlefield. Your iPhone becomes a true Virtual Reality display – it is a window into a 3D virtual world full of hostile helicopter gunships and jet bombers coming at you from all angles in 32 levels of increasingly difficult numbers and tactical formations. You are alone on a flak tower armed with an Ack-Ack gun, Rockets, and a limited supply of guided missiles.

It comes with a price tag of $2.99, pretty high as compared to other games but its worth its price. It is more convincing than the other FPS simulators you may have seen, which makes gameplay both more frenetic and immersive!

4. Dimension Invaders

Dimension Invaders is an augmented reality game that uses the iPhone camera, compass and accelerometer to give you an augmented reality experience.

Through twelve increasing difficulty levels, the enemy spaceships come, shoot and try to crash with you. They come from every possible orientation and you can see the enemy spaceships through your iPhone camera. You can look for them in the app left bottom radar, point them with the cross hair and shoot touching anywhere on the screen, with your iPhone in landscape mode.

This awesome game is available in the App store for a price of $0.99, Get it here.

5. Firefighter 360

Firefighter 360 for the iPhone lets you experience the thrill of seeing everything around you burst into flames, without all that pesky heat and death. The augmented reality game superimposes fires — and virtual victims — over the iPhone camera’s view of the world, with flames generated in every direction, spreading and multiplying. And it’s up to you, as an inexplicably cel-shaded fireman, to douse the flames and rescue the citizens.

6. TagDis [Free]

TagDis is the virtual graffiti game you play in the real world. You cam create your own street art, drop it in the virtual world, and battle other artists to become King of the streets. Ofcourse you can’t do the same in the real world like a gangsta!

7. AR Girl

Not really a game, but AR Girl is the first and the funniest augmented reality music app. ARGirl is the best way to amuse your friends and listen to your favorite songs with AR Girls who will show you 13 dance types right on your table or even on your hand.

You need to draw or print simple AR marker. Look at the marker through ARGirl camera on your iPhone. and you will see a pretty girl staying on the marker! Select songs to play from your iPhone library and AR girl will dance.

8. Ghost Bastards AR

Ghost Bastards AR game turns your device into the unique ultra sensitive instrument to see hordes of ghosts, bustling around humanity, and your fingers become an anti-ghost weapon. Go ahead and hunt these cute, but wild and totally uncontrolled entities!

9. SpecTrek

If you didn’t like Ghost Bastards then you can try SpecTrek, an AR ghost hunting game where your world is being invaded by Ghosts. It is your task to track down these ethereal entities and catch them before they can do any harm.

The basic gameplay is simple: hold your phone flat to view the map. Use the map to locate ghosts and navigate the area to approach them. Hold up your phone to open the camera view. The camera view allows you to scan and catch ghosts.